ब्राह्मस्फुटसिद्धान्त (ब्रह्मगुप्त - शून्य, कुट्टक, बीजगणित एवं सम्पूर्ण २१ अध्याय सान्वय सटीक)

LAGHU-BHĀSKARĪYA 73

Mahā-Bhāskarīya. Shukla further says that the arrangement of the contents of the Laghu-Bhāskarīya is more systematic and logical than that of the Mahā-Bhāskarīya, and is, at the same time, in keeping with the general practice followed by the other Hindu astronomers. Numerous quotations of this work occur in the annotative works of Sūryadeva (b. 1191 A.D.), Yallaya (1480 A.D.), Nīlakaṇṭha (1500 A.D.), Raghunātha Rāja (1597 A.D.), Govinda Somayājī and Viṣṇu Śarmā and in the Prayoga- racanā, an anonymous commentary on the Mahā-Bhāskarīyam. We find the commentaries of this abridged work in Malayalam and Tamil also. All this speaks of the great popularity of this work. There are circumstantial evidences to show that Bhāskara I had associations with the countries of Aśmaka and Surāṣṭra. His commentary on the Āryabhaṭīya was probably written in the city of Valabhī in Surāṣṭra. Perhaps Bhāskara I was born and educated in Aśmaka and later on he migrated to Valabhī, where he wrote his commentary on the Āryabhaṭīya or that he was a native of Valabhī and got his education in the Aśmaka country. Perhaps there was a strong school of Astronomy in the Aśmaka country, which was founded by the followers of Āryabhaṭa, so much so that at places, Bhāskara I has also called Āryabhaṭa as Aśmaka, his Āryabhaṭīyam by the name Aśmaka- Tantra or the Āśmakīya and the followers of Āryabhaṭa as Āśmakīyāḥ. This Aśmaka country or Aśmaka Janapada is men- tioned in the Buddhist literature also. It was somewhere either in the north-west of India, or was situated between the rivers Narmadā and Godāvarī. Bhāskara I was evidently a resident of the latter Aśmaka (which was between the Narmadā and Godāvarī). Brahamagupta and Bhāskara I were contemporaries. Both of them developed their systems in the earlier part of the seventh century A.D. (3700 years of Kaliyuga). Brahāmasphuṭasiddhānta was written in 628 A.D. and the commentary on the Ārya- bhaṭīyam by Bhāskara I was composed in 629 A. D. Bhāskara closely followed Āryabhaṭa, but Brahmagupta had the guts to oppose the views expressed by this great master and he not only contradicted him at places, but also propounded many new ideas, methods of calculation and constants of greater accuracy.